Friday

Jul 20, 2018 at 12:43 PM

ADRIAN — A former game show champion has a chance to clear her record but will have to pay restitution for hacking the emails of Adrian College’s president.

Stephanie June Jass, 48, of Tecumseh was a history professor at Adrian College when she accessed President Jeffrey Docking’s email account in April 2017. She pleaded guilty in June to one felony count of unauthorized computer access. Lenawee County Circuit Judge Margaret M.S. Noe on Friday granted Jass’ request for a delayed sentence, but ordered her to pay restitution in an amount to be determined. Noe placed Jass on probation for one year and ordered the case be reviewed June 14.

“I will not give you another chance to disappoint this court or violate your terms of probation,” Noe told Jass. “That would just be intolerable.”

Jass could face up to five years in prison if she violates probation. If she does not violate probation, she could have the charge removed from her record.

A plea agreement dismissed a second charge of using a computer to commit a crime with a maximum imprisonment of four to 10 years.

She became famous in 2012 when she became, at the time, the winningest woman contestant on the television game show “Jeopardy!” by winning seven consecutive games.

When Jass pleaded guilty in June, she admitted to being at home on April 25, 2017, when she accessed another person’s email account.

Michigan State Police were asked to investigate by college staff who suspected Jass had accessed others’ email accounts. The state police’s Cyber Command Center said in December charges were authorized after a forensic examination of the digital evidence.

Jass was formally charged in December.

Docking addressed the court to describe what happened after his assistant told him on May 5, 2017, that someone had stolen his identity and “thousands and thousands” of his emails had been taken.

“I immediately thought of personal conversations I had had with my wife; intimate conversations I had with my children; medical situations in my family that are very, very personal that should not be exposed to anybody,” he told the court. “I even thought of my father-in-law who died of cancer during the process of when my emails had been stolen and some very intimate conversations that we had had before he passed away. It was embarrassing, it was wrong, it should never have happened.”

He said colleagues have asked if memos had been taken.

“I didn’t know for sure,” Docking said.

Some of the emails involved fundraising to support scholarships for the college’s students, he said.

“In the midst of this whole thing, in my opinion, we’ve wasted over $16,000 in attorney fees that could’ve gone to those kids in scholarship support,” Docking said. “I strongly encourage the court to have those reimbursed to the college.”

He said the “most striking” part of the situation was that in the 15 months since the unauthorized access Jass had not apologized to him, in person, in writing or through an intermediary.

“When I grew up, I was taught that if you make a mistake, that’s human, but apologizing’s the right thing to do” Docking said. “Even when she stood here five minutes ago, there was no apology to the victim.

“So has she learned her lesson? I don’t know.”

After Docking, spoke, Jass’ attorney, Raymond Correll of Farmington Hills, told the court that he “advised her not to have any contact with the college, to not send a written apology while the case was pending as any attorney would do.”

He said Jass “readily confessed” and cooperated with the investigating detective and the college’s human resources department.

Before Docking spoke, Jass, who was accompanied by her husband and other relatives, told the court she has admitted her guilt and takes responsibility for what she did. She said she is “sorry for all the pain that I have caused my friends, my family, my community, and I am ready to make amends and go back to being a credit to my friends, my family, my congregation and my community.”

Correll asked Noe to follow the recommendation of the probation department based on her lack of criminal contacts with law enforcement, her remorse and her standing in the community. He also asked her to take into account the “voluminous” number of letters sent to the court on Jass’ behalf.

“Ms. Jass recognized this was not a mistake, she intentionally committed a crime. She’s accepted responsibility for that,” he said.

Noe said she read the more than 60 letters written on Jass’ behalf.

“When I read letters of support, I often wonder if they have the facts. Do they know? They know you, it’s apparent that they know you … and how surprised they are at the behavior that they recognize you acknowledge, and that is contrary to your personality or at least their appreciation for who you are in their world,” Noe said. “And it is very difficult to credit that without knowing what it is that they know that you did or didn’t do.”

“You in fact shared this information with a person, a colleague, I believe, who, as we say in our world, ratted you out, and thus this became a public matter and your crime was acknowledged,” Noe said.

To the person who reported what Jass did, Noe recognized their “dedication to integrity” and doing what was right.

Acknowledging that Jass was a teacher, she said, “I believe what you’ve done is taught a lot of people a very serious measure in breaking the law. The nation is in fear of this kind of behavior.”

Noe said she couldn’t imagine the college’s embarrassment of answering questions from people who wondered if their conversations has been accessed.

“What you did was wrong,” Noe said. “And the fact that you kept it and shared it in secret fashion concerns me because I find therein deception.”

She said sometimes good people do bad things, but “sometimes bad things are much more difficult to reverse.”

As Noe spoke to Jass, Correll’s hand was on Jass’ hand on the podium as they stood beside each other.

When Noe said she would grant the delayed sentence, Jass mouthed, “Thank you.”

After the hearing, Jass declined further comment.

Docking said after the hearing that Jass was fortunate to not have been sent to jail for a short term.

“A conviction on a felony sends a message that if you steal a victim’s identity in Lenawee County that you’ll pay a heavy price,” Docking said.

Jass accessed the emails after the college’s information technology staff reset the passwords for its email system.

Docking said Jass accessing his emails was about more than simply seeing if she could.

“It was pretty clear to me she had much more nefarious intentions with accessing these emails,” he said.

Along with delaying the sentence and ordering restitution, Noe ordered Jass pay $1,008 in court costs.

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